


Ruby Red

by fEl24601



Series: Ruby Red [1]
Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Canon Compliant, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 18:15:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15418764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fEl24601/pseuds/fEl24601
Summary: Set about 8 years post-canon.Life for the Snow-Pitches is turned upside down when Simon's project, the London Home for Magical Youths, is attacked.





	Ruby Red

SIMON

 

It had taken me years— literal years— of advocating to finally get someone in the goddamn World of Mages to open a magical children’s home. Sure, magical parents never gave up their children because the magic in them was too precious to part with, but for Crowley’s sake, there were so many monsters and dangers and threats, and so many parents passed away and left kids behind. It was about time that magical orphans had a place to go to be cared for, truly cared for, and have their caregivers understand what was happening as they came into their magic. Someone to ease their transitions from care to Watford, and give them a welcoming place to return to in the summers. The home filled up quick with children of all ages, some who had been living in Normal homes for some time. Magical families gradually began to adopt them, mostly the infants, and I got to be a part of so many little orphaned mages getting the life they deserved. Baz and had talked about it a lot since the home opened. Someday, when we were ready, our child (children?) would come from the home.

Of course, because the world is a nightmare sometimes and people can be terrible, two short years after the London Home for Magical Youths opened its doors, it was attacked.

It shouldn’t have been possible. There were spells on spells on spells designed to keep anyone with malicious intent out, and to protect any children within the walls from harm. But somehow, it still happened.

It was December. The children who were old enough to be at Watford were staying there over winter break (Headmistress Mitali Bunce ensured that there were still staff and celebrations over the break for any students who wished to stay) and the others were sound asleep, dreaming of gifts and food and trying desperately not to get their hopes up too high that this Christmas might be a truly special one.

Baz was home for the break. Not that he ever really used his quarters at Watford anyway (though the professor’s rooms are pretty nice,) he favoured spelling himself back to our flat (“ **there’s no place like home** ”) and spending the evenings together. As did I. I was looking forward to three weeks of just the two of us (save for my time at the bakery, but the perks of owning the place included getting to decide just how much time I actually spent there) and seeing Penny when she came back to the UK to visit her parents on Christmas Eve.

It was well past when we should have gone to bed, but we were curled together on the couch, me dozing and Baz reading,my tail was wrapped lazily around his leg, and his cool fingers were playing in my hair. I hummed, feeling _perfect,_ and Baz’s lips brushed my forehead.

“What should we do tomorrow?” he murmured, setting the book down. His arm wrapped around me.

I held him closer. “Absolutely nothing,” I said into his chest. He smelled like home. Cedar, bergamot, and sleep.

“It’s a plan,” he said. And we might have fallen asleep right there on our couch, in front of our fireplace, if my phone hadn’t rang. I scrambled for it, startled, and shivered when I lifted myself off my husband. My phone was discarded on the coffee table, blinding and moving a bit with the force of the vibrate. I squinted at the number.

“Who is it?” Baz asked, settling back in behind me as I perched on the edge of the couch. He sat his chin on my shoulder, peering over.

“The home. Why the hell are they calling me in the middle of the night?” I accepted the call and put the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“Simon,” Laurie said over an incredible din from the other end. It sounded like— shouting? And crashing? “We’re being attacked. Come quickly— we’re trying to get the children out and to safety, but—“ Her voice cut out as a thunderous sound boomed through the phone. Baz was already leaping up and scooping up jackets and keys.

“Laurie?” I said, loudly, “what is it, who’s there? What’s attacking?”

Someone was shouting, and children were crying.

“Hurry!” she said, and the line went dead.

I didn’t have two seconds to be frozen in shock. Baz threw me my coat while he put on his boots, and seconds later we were racing out the door.

 

I drove while Baz clutched his wand, muttering “ **out of my way”** and “ **make way for the king** ” to get us there faster. I saw the home from six blocks away. The South Wing was up in flames. I pressed the pedal to the floor and swung into the parking lot. We leapt out of the car and ran from it, lights still on and doors hanging open.

Laurie was huddled with three other of the care staff, counting children. One toddler crib with a wheel snapped off was crowded with all of the infants, wailing.

“Laurie!” I cried, and ran up to her.

Her face was wet with tears. “Vampires,” she said. “At least a dozen. The fire caught by accident- we were trying to fight them off-“

“The children?” Baz asked, gripping my arm.

She was shaking her head. “We got almost all of them out. Steph and Andrew are in there, trying to get the last few.”

“Which wing were they in?” I said, as Baz asked “Was anyone bitten?”

“I don’t think so— not yet—“

Two figures came running out of the dark North Wing, each carrying two children. The kids already outside shouted when they emerged, some running towards them. The other caregivers were scrambling to keep them close.

Laurie sobbed, more tears pouring forth.

“Laurie—“ I cried, “how many more children are there?”

She wiped her cheeks with her palms, fast, and ran her pen down her clipboard. “Shit,” she whispered. A little boy clutched at her legs.

“Laurie!”

“Simon I’m sorry, there’s one more— Ruby in the South Wing.”

I looked up at the burning building.

“Go, love,” Baz said, with a kiss to my temple. His eyes swam with tears, this was all too familiar for him. “I’ll help them out here.” I squeezed his hand and ran.

 

The heat hit me like an assault, but the smoke made me gag. I held a wing up like a shield in front of my face. Dragon wings, fireproof. Another way in which Baz and I were complete opposites. I ran blindly, eyes squeezed shut against the smoke, ducking into every room I passed and shouting “hello?” until my voice gave out after a few. The walls were ablaze, and the ceiling was starting to come down in the middle of the hallways. I ran along the walls, ducking under flaming beams. “Ruby?” I tried to shout, but the smoke was in my lungs. I kept running, seeing only red and yellow. I ran up the stairs.

The roar of the fire was deafening, I couldn’t have heard any cries for help or coughs if little Ruby had had the breath to make them. I searched every room. I looked under fallen furniture. I didn’t find a girl, but nor did I find a corpse.

No vampires either. Presumably the fire had touched them all. They would just be piles of ash by now. I couldn’t stand to think about how fast a vampire would crumble into dust, just from a few sparks. I shoved the thought from my mind.

Finally on the third floor, in the first room I charged into, I found her. The beds on either side of the door had caught fire, effectively blocking her exit. She was huddled on a bed on the opposite side, tiny and sobbing, no more than five years old. She looked up when she saw me, huge brown eyes full of tears reflecting the leaping flames. I used my wings as shields and ran into the room to her side.

“I’m going to get you out,” I choked, with just enough voice that she could hear. She was too scared to move. “I’m going to pick you up, okay? My wings are fireproof. You’ll be safe.” I picked her up, holding her close, and wrapped my wings tight around us. Her little hands gripped my shirt.

I ran back out the hallway and down two flights of stairs, hurtling down the main hall as the building broke around us. By the time I burst out into cold night air, her arms were clutched tight around my neck.

Baz was on me in a second, hugging me while I coughed, mindful of the child between us. She was coughing too, shaking with the force of it. Baz took her when I doubled over, retching from the smoke. “It’s all right,” I heard him murmur to her. “You’re safe. You’re all right.”

Vampires. Attacked the children’s home. After _everything—_ after all these poor children had been through. After all the work we’d put in to give them a safe home. Two whole decades after the attack on Watford’s nursery. I retched again. It was all so unfair, so absolutely cruel.

When I could draw a real breath again, I caught Laurie’s eye across the parking lot. She waved in acknowledgement, crouched and surrounded by children.

Ruby’s head was on Baz’s shoulder, eyes squeezed shut while she cried. I laid my head on his other shoulder, wrapping an arm around his waist.

“Are you okay?” he asked me, pressing his cheek to my hair. I nodded. Baz tenderly pulled a few ash flakes from Ruby’s dark hair. She was shivering, and he opened his coat to pull it around her.

“Simon,” he said suddenly. I looked up, gripping him tighter. In his efforts to remove the ash from her hair, he’d brushed it to the side, over one shoulder. On her neck were two puncture marks. Fangs.

“Crowley,” I breathed.

Baz was looking at her with wide eyes, jaw clenched tight. Her little arms were locked tight around his neck.

Laurie was scurrying toward us, clipboard in hand.

“Thank magic for you, Simon,” she said. “Oh, Ruby,” she laid a hand on Ruby’s hair, “I’m so glad you’re all right.” She wiped her face again and looked at me. Now that the children were safe and calming down, the other caregivers behind us were attempting to spell the fire out. It was huge, and they were rattled, and little was happening despite their attempts. “I’ll get the insurance paperwork going in the morning,” Laurie said, “and we’ll get a team in to start fixing everything as well. If we get enough volunteer mages it shouldn’t take long. There are plenty of rooms in the North Wing that we can have the children in tonight. Everyone is safe now.”

“Did any of the vampires get away?” I asked.

“We don’t know. Most of them were in the South Wing, so they should be…. taken care of. The rest I don’t know, we were focused on the children.”

“Of course,” I said. “Thank you Laurie, you kept them all safe.”

She stroked Ruby’s hair again. “Thank goodness they’re all okay,” she breathed, eyes welling with tears again.

Baz cleared his throat. He didn’t speak, so Ruby wouldn’t hear, just gestured for Laurie to look. Laurie gasped.

Immediately she was blustering, crying that it was all her fault, and what would they do now, and the poor, poor child. Baz and I looked at each other, and I was fairly sure that the same idea was taking shape in both our minds.

“No one will adopt a child mage who’s a vampire,” I said, quietly so Ruby wouldn’t hear. “She’ll be here until she’s eighteen. They already don’t seem to want kids over two, let alone….”

A tear slipped down Baz’s cheek, and he didn’t move to brush it away. I did for him. His hands were holding Ruby tight. She looked tremendously right in his arms.

“She’s going to need someone who knows how to help her,” he whispered. I’m not sure his voice would work if he tried. I nodded.

“She needs to know she’s not alone. And someone to help her learn how to feed, and to stay safe.”

His eyes were dark and grey and searching. I hoped he could see what I was thinking. I was so afraid to say it out loud. Simultaneously we turned to look at Ruby, at her little hands bunched in the back of Baz’s collar. This little vampire mage needed help. She needed a family. She lifted her head, at long last, and her brown eyes darted fast between Baz’s face and mine. We both cracked teary smiles.

“Hi Ruby,” I said, softly. Her eyes locked on mine. “My name’s Simon. This is Baz.”

“You have magic wings,” she said. I nodded. She didn’t smile, but some of the fear left her face.

“Are you okay, Ruby?” Baz asked her. “Does anything hurt?” If it didn’t yet, it would soon. From what I remembered of Baz’s story, this little girl was in for a world of pain over the next day or so while the venom worked its way through her.

One hand came up and touched the side of her neck. She nodded. Baz drew his coat tighter around her. My heart ached. “That’s going to hurt for a while. But don’t worry, you’ll be okay. The same thing happened to me once.”

“Really?” she said, and her fingers clutched his shirt again. He offered her a tight smile. She’s hardly said two sentences and we were already gone.

Laurie’s hand brushed my arm. She raised her eyebrows at me.

I looked to Baz again. We met each others’ eyes.

“Are we ready for this?” I whispered.

“No one ever is,” he said. We grinned, and I pressed a kiss to his cheek, arm still tight around him.

I glanced at Laurie. “How quickly can you get some paperwork going?”

Laurie pressed her lips together to keep from crying, and failed terrifically.

 

The office was one of the rooms unaffected, by some miracle. There was a brief discussion about returning tomorrow to fill out the paperwork and collect Ruby, but while we spoke the caregivers were ushering the dozens of terrified children back into the building to share a few crowded rooms for the night. It seemed best to take her home immediately.

Because I’d helped to open the place and did a lot of work there every week, most of my paperwork was already complete and filed away under my employment records. The home check, background checks on myself and Baz, among a handful of other forms, were already complete so that he and I could be on the premises regularly. We had to give her a middle and a last name. Snow-Pitch was easy, we’d argued over Snow-Pitch vs Pitch-Snow and settled on it shortly before our marriage last year. Baz couldn’t speak when I suggested Natasha as her middle name, but I took his silence as a yes and wrote it on the form. The rest didn’t take long (I had a feeling some of it Laurie left to finish up tomorrow, anything that didn’t require our signatures) and it was only about an hour later that we were retreating from the building. Laurie handed me the same blanket we offered to all new families, soft and blue. Ruby dozed on Baz’s shoulder the whole time. Laurie didn’t wake her as we left, not even to tell her the news as she always did when a child was adopted. “Tell her yourself, at home,” she said with a smile.

 

My eyes were still red and watery from the smoke, so Baz drove us home. It took a minute to loosen Ruby’s arms from around his neck without waking her, but we managed it fairly well. She was warm and soft, all pink skin and little limbs and dark hair. I held her to me in the backseat, as we obviously didn’t have a carseat yet. Luckily we lived fairly nearby, and the roads were empty at that ungodly hour of the night. At every red light, Baz turned for a moment to look at us. His face was all wonder. He’d never looked more beautiful.

 

Ruby woke up when we opened the door to the flat. She blinked blearily at me, and squinted when she saw my wings over my shoulder.

“Ruby,” I murmured, taking her slowly into the flat. Baz shut the door softly behind us. I hardly knew what to say. I knew what Laurie’s spiel was, all about how a family has chosen you and this is your forever home, but somehow I couldn’t say those words. Baz came to my side, slipping an arm around my shoulders to rest his hand by Ruby’s arm.

“This is our home,” he said.

“Yours?” she asked, twisting around to get a look at the room. Thank magic I’d cleaned in anticipation of Baz coming home that afternoon.

I could only look at her, at her big brown eyes taking in everything, her sweet little face puckered in confusion, the bite mark on her neck, looking less angry since Baz cast a “ **get well soon** ” for her. “Ours and yours,” I said.

She looked between Baz and I again, tilting her head to the side. “Are you married?” she asked, like a true five year old, and I grinned.

“Yes,” I said.

Her eyes went wide. Her voice came out hushed, full of wonder. “Are you my family now?”

I couldn’t speak, just smiled at her while my eyes welled up. Baz brushed some hair from her face. “We are,” he whispered. “We’re a family now.”

 

She passed back out against my shoulder minutes later. We laid her to sleep in our bed, and found ourselves standing right over her, touching her hair and staring at her face and completely unable to leave the room. We clutched each other, disbelieving.

“We’re parents,” I breathed. “What the fuck is going on?”

Baz laughed silently while he shushed me, tugging me close and pressing a finger to my lips. “Watch your language around our daughter, Snow.”

I sucked in a shuddering breath, almost a gasp, at hearing the words. They sounded unbelievable in Baz’s low voice. (I was way too overcome to snap back with my usual “Snow- _Pitch.”)_ Ruby rolled over then, yawning adorably, and we reluctantly backed out of the room so we wouldn’t wake her.

As soon as we were back in the living room I shoved Baz up against the nearest wall and kissed the hell out of him. He gripped my back and I clutched his hair, and we kissed each other breathless. “We’re parents,” we whispered over and over. “Crowley.” “We’re parents.” “What the hell.” Then we broke apart very suddenly, eyes wide.

“Shit,” Baz said. “We’re parents.”

“I know,” I said.

“There’s so much to do,” he said.

“I don’t think I could sleep right now if my life depended on it,” I told him. He nodded at me, understanding completely, and we hurried to the second bedroom to get to work.

We got to sleep just before dawn. I cleared out the room and found new places for the stuff we’d shoved in there over the last few years while Baz stood in the middle with his wand, transforming it as best he could. The walls turned periwinkle, the dust vanished, the carpet sprung up into fleecy softness. There was only so much that spells could do, so we made a list of everything to go out and buy in the morning. We fell asleep sprawled on the couch, in roughly the same position we’d started the night in.

 

*     *     *

 

By Christmas morning, life looked so different.

We woke up at six, and Baz was half-shocked that Ruby hadn’t burst in at dawn announcing the date and urging everyone to go check for evidence of a visit from Santa.

“She’s a care home kid,” I reminded him. “Christmas has never been a big event for her.” We’d made it one, though. Once she woke up (or we woke her up if we got too impatient) our little girl was in for a treat. 

Baz nodded. “I can’t wait for her to wake up,” he said, a grin growing on his face. He looked stunning, all grey eyes and black hair and a huge smile. I kissed him then, pressing him into the sheets (my favourite place for him to be.) He was warm, and supple and gentle in a way he only was when he was half asleep.

“Merry Christmas,” I murmured against his lips.

“Merry Christmas,” he replied, hands on either side of my face.

 

We made breakfast while we waited. Baz made the drinks, passing me my tea while he sipped his coffee. I warmed up cinnamon buns that my coworkers at the bakery had sent over for Christmas Eve. A card was attached, with congratulations from everyone and a generous gift certificate to be put towards the expenses of parenthood. They’d been so wonderful since I told them the news a few days after Ruby came home. They sent me home immediately, telling me they’d see me in ten months or so, and not to worry about the bakery. Baz’s leave would start with the new term at Watford, and he wouldn’t return until Mitali approved him. She (and the rest of the Bunces) had met Ruby at Christmas Eve dinner, when they had us over. Penny was instantly smitten, and Ruby took a liking to her too. Once Ruby got a look at Pen’s blue hair, it was over. Auntie Penny is her favourite forever, now. Mitali understood the significance of the situation, particularly the vampirism, and on the spot granted Baz a minimum twelve month leave to integrate Ruby into our lives.

“You can’t come back in the middle of the fall term anyway,” she said with a grin. “There would be no work for you to do.”

 

Ruby had been sleeping through the night, as far as we could tell, which was an improvement. The first week she’d been with us, after the pain from her bite receded, she gasped awake several times a night from nightmares, or anxiety, or any number of other things. She’d been through a lot, and it was a huge transition to meet new people and move into a new home— not to mention Turning. That pain started during the first night, and got severe enough that it woke her up in the morning. She sobbed until nightfall, saying she burned all over. Baz and I took turns holding her, staying with her the entire time. It was awful, absolutely fucking awful, seeing a tiny child— _our_ tiny child—in such pain. Baz murmured in her ear over and over that it would end, that it would be all right, that he remembered how bad it felt and he was so sorry. I don’t think the three of us stopped crying the entire day. At some point Baz collected himself enough to run out and get the kid essentials that we needed (I offered to do it, but he shot me a glare and mumbled something about colour coordination.) When the pain let up finally she was exhausted. We were afraid to put her to bed in her new room and have her wake up confused and frightened in an unfamiliar place, and maybe we didn’t want to let her out of our sight, as well. She slept in Baz’s arms on the couch that night, all of us tangled up together. Finally, on her second day home with us, she was able to explore the flat, discover her new bedroom, have a bath.

The next two weeks were full of discoveries. Like that her favourite snack was buttered toast (the kid liked butter almost as much as me), that she only really enjoyed baths with bubbles (fair) and she loved storybooks like no other. Storytime quickly became about six times a day. Baz dove headfirst into the realm of parenting books and research, and declared often that it was excellent that she liked books and that it was very good for her development.

She became a vital component in our long-standing morning routine. I always woke up well before Baz, and would usually make breakfast while I let him sleep. He claimed to need coffee first thing to function, so I always humoured him and woke him up with coffee in bed. (Of course, some mornings I didn’t want to get up either, or wanted to take advantage of the fact that my gorgeous husband was lying shirtless next to me in our bed. This, he said, was also a tolerable way to start the day. Ruby’s arrival had set that on the back burner for the time being, however.) Ruby was an early bird like me, and she thought this coffee routine was hilarious, like some kind of ‘wake up’ potion that he needed to be roused from sleep. She took to bringing him his coffee, carefully, holding it with both hands, while I followed behind her and observed with a smile on my face. Baz nearly died of happiness the first time she did it. She handed him his mug with a “Good morning, Father!” and all he could do was set it straight down on the bedside table and catch her in a hug. She also likes to help me cook, and sometimes helps out as my sous chef, cracking eggs and stirring things. These were the times when it was Baz’s turn to stand in the doorway and stare, just appreciating the picture. Ruby was a pancakes girl, we found out, so those got added to the breakfast rotation for saturday mornings.

 

Little footsteps startled me, and I turned around from my spot against the kitchen counter to see Ruby stumbling sleepily toward us. She was wearing her new pyjamas, a gift from the Bunces, and she was too cute for words. She rubbed her eyes with the sleeves bunched around her fists. When her hands came away from her eyes, she blinked a few times, noticing the sight before her. Her mouth dropped open when her eyes took in the Christmas tree, resplendent in the colours she’d helped us decorate it in, sitting atop a small mountain of presents.

Wordless, she turned to us, eyes full of questions.

“Merry Christmas, Ruby,” Baz said, grinning. And then she took off toward us, and we barely had time to crouch down to our knees before Ruby’s little arms were flung out toward us, catching us both in a surprisingly strong hug. We laughed and we hugged her between us, rocking back and forth because we couldn’t do anything but.

She could hardly choose between eating her cinnamon bun or opening presents first.

“The presents aren’t going anywhere,” I said, “but the cinnamon bun will cool down.” She nodded at me as though I’d made a very wise point, and Baz lifted her up onto the counter so she could sit and eat. She loved sitting up high. The table was for every day of course, but the counter was for special occasions.

Each time she opened a gift, she was shocked to find that there was another one. We spoiled her, obviously, it was her first Christmas with us and our first Christmas with a daughter, and she hadn’t had any possessions of her own before we took her home two weeks prior. Many of the gifts were from Baz’s family, which they’d sent over. (They invited us for Christmas dinner, but we decided it would be too much for Ruby to meet so many new people in such a short amount of time. We’d introduce them later.) More still were from the folks at the bakery, and the Watford staff. Everyone was so excited for us, and for her. Baz and I had agreed to forego presents for each other, for so many reasons, the least of which was that Ruby herself was gift enough to us both. She thanked us over and over after every gift— toys and books and clothes and craft supplies and decorations for her room….

A few hours later, I shoved the final remnants of wrapping paper into the recycling and came back into the living room, where my husband and daughter were curled on the couch watching Rudolph. She was tucked into his side, eyes half-closed while she watched, clutching her new stuffed bat. (From Mordelia. I cracked up. Baz took a few minutes to come around to the hilarity.) Each of them had a shiny foil bow stuck to their heads, Baz because Ruby had put it there, and Ruby because her hair was long and curly and tended to collect things. I smiled, big and goofy, and felt like my heart was doing that bit from the Grinch where it grows three sizes all at once. How on earth did I get this? How did I get so lucky?

Baz looked up at me, relaxed and smiling. “Get over here, Snow. It’s Rudolph time.”

How could I turn down such a request? I joined them on the couch, settling in on Ruby’s other side. I ran a finger over her bat, amused, and she grabbed my hand and held onto it, keeping it there. My heart grew a few more sizes.

Ruby grinned when Baz and I hummed along to ‘Silver and Gold.’ She swayed her head back and forth in time to the music. “Pretty song,” she said. She asked if we could play it again, so we did. We rewound it over and over and over, until she knew all the words and sang along.

“You’re a good singer,” Baz told her, looking overcome.

“I like singing,” she said.

“Your father plays the violin,” I told her, grinning at Baz.

“I want to hear it!” she said, and Baz, for the first time in his life, put up no fight whatsoever. We paused Rudolph (and forgot about it for ages) while he played her song after song (Silver and Gold was requested many times.) Her sweet little face was lit up with a huge smile, and she and I applauded wildly after each song. When she started singing along (perfectly, honestly. Shockingly good), I thought Baz might topple over. A while later she ran to put her bat in her bed and trade him for a different animal, and Baz sagged against me.

“She’s a musician,” he said, disbelieving.

“She’s a natural,” I agreed.

His voice was thick. “My daughter is a musician.” I hugged him tight.

“I can’t believe she’s ours,” I said. He shook his head, as disbelieving as me.

 

We spent the day watching Christmas movies, interspersed from time to time with Baz playing renditions of Christmas songs at Ruby’s request. I cooked turkey dinner, and Ruby helped me mash the potatoes and set the table. Next year we’d join the Grimms, most likely, but it was perfect to have our first Christmas together be just us. We popped Christmas crackers and wore the flimsy paper crowns (Ruby thought they were great. We called her Princess Ruby while she wore hers, which prompted her to call us Prince Father and Prince Dad) and ate mountains of cookies and fruitcake for dessert. Eventually Ruby fell asleep in front of Frosty the Snowman, sprawled over both of our laps, gingerbread crumbs on her face and her stuffed red dragon (also Mordelia, also hilarious) held tight in her hands. Baz carried her to her bed, and I committed the image to memory. We tucked her into bed, under her new quilt from Ms Possibelf, and Baz and I each kissed her forehead.

“Good night, Ruby,” I whispered.

“Sweet dreams, love,” he murmured.

“Merry Christmas, Father,” she said, not even opening her eyes, “merry Christmas, Dad.” She curled up, bat and dragon in each hand, and sighed a little as she slipped off to sleep.

Just like the night we brought her home, and just like every night after that, it took everything we had to not stare at her all night, just watching her move and breathe and be peaceful. We dragged ourselves out and into our room, and laughed at each other for the happy tears that slipped down our cheeks.

 

We were a family. It wasn’t perfect. There were nights that Ruby came running into our room, crying from a nightmare of vampires and fire, or days where we found her huddled in her bed, shivering and unable to tell us what was wrong. It took days to coax it out of her that she still thought about the home, and all those months she spent wondering whether she’d ever have a family to love her. That sometimes she still feared it was all a dream, that she would wake up back there, lonely. Or that we would decide we didn’t want her anymore and send her back. We did our best to soothe her, reminding her that we loved her and she was our family and we’d never want her to go, but we knew it wasn’t the kind of issue we could kiss and make better. We tried, though. We tried so hard. Luckily she was a child who loved hugs, loved affection, loved family time. We gave her all we had and more.

In mid January she started going to a little school that Mitali had started up, for mage children too young to go to Watford. It ran like a perfectly Normal primary school, except magic was no secret and the classes were tiny. There Ruby made some friends, nice little kids her age, and she proved herself to be an eager and capable student. We also found her a singing teacher, who she saw once a week, and those days quickly became her favourites.

We missed her while she was gone. Every day while Ruby was at school, Baz and I did our shopping and cleaning and cooking and the nine hundred other tasks that come with having a five year old and a home to take care of, and as soon as we finished we’d find ourselves on the couch or our bed, snuggled up, leaning on each other and waiting for her to come back. (As soon as the exhaustion of fatherhood became our at-all-times state and was no longer something unusual and debilitating, we learned to take advantage of those times when she was out. Repeatedly. But in those first few weeks, all we wanted to do was wait for her.)

She was still fairly reserved, still not totally sold that this flat was as much hers as it was ours. She rarely left messes, for one thing, which seemed out of character for a five year old. If she built a castle or a spaceship or a pirate ship out of blocks, she put them all away as soon as she was done. It was a good habit to be in, but I got the feeling that she didn’t want her creations to be underfoot. We started to encourage her to leave things she’d made out for a while, as long as she still planned on playing with them. I think she really got the message the rainy sunday when we yanked all the pillows and blankets off the beds and piled up chairs and broomsticks in the living room to build the biggest and best blanket fort the world had ever seen. We left it up all day. We even ate spaghetti dinner inside it (very carefully.) (Baz was very smug when all the spaghetti stains on the carpet were caused by me, not our child.)

We were a work in progress, our little family. But we loved each other so much.Baz and I told Ruby daily that we loved her, that we would always love her. We still couldn’t believe how quickly she took to calling us her dads, but it was only about three days after we brought her home that she said “Thanks, Dad,” when I handed her lunch. Then we had to figure out who was who- because Dad and Dad would get confusing fast. Dad was already mine— that much was certain. Neither of us liked Papa (Baz said it made him feel ninety) so Baz settled on Father. Ruby picked it right up, unfazed. She fit right in with us, the perfect little puzzle piece. A few months in she’d started to pick up our mannerisms. She shrugged like me (Baz couldn’t believe that of all things she’d picked up _that_ from me), but it was nothing compared to the dexterity she was developing with her eyebrows. Sometimes, if I did something clumsy or ridiculous, I’d catch Baz and Ruby both cocking an eyebrow at me, looking like a perfect pair.

She was so very like us, it was hard to believe sometimes that she hadn’t just sprung forth by magic, a perfect blend of Baz and I. I loved her so much it hurt.

The home was fixed up in no time, and tons of additional safety spells were added. Whenever I was there to check in, Laurie peppered me with questions about Ruby and Baz and our lives. I told her over and over, it was wonderful. Ruby was more and more herself every day. We were so happy she came into our lives.

She wasn’t in for an easy ride. Baz was dreading the day that her fangs came in and he had to teach her how to hunt. His blood usually came from the butcher’s these days, but sometimes it wasn’t possible to acquire, so she would need to know how to track down her own. He never wanted the day to come, but he was so glad that she would have him to help her, that she wouldn’t have to go through it all alone. Mitali had even promised that the kitchens at Watford would keep some blood stocked, once she started attending. No more Watford students would be hunting rats in the catacombs, she promised. Never again.

Baz and I vowed that our daughter would have an easier life than we had. She would always know how to feed herself safely. She would marry whoever she damn well pleased, if she wanted to at all (Malcolm was still not totally convinced that our marriage wasn’t a ‘phase’) and she would never feel crushed under the weight of a prophecy. She would never have to face either her own or her roommate’s imminent death in a war she had no desire to participate in. She would never feel unwanted, she would always have loving parents. And someday when she was a teenager and woefully in love with someone, we would be there to hug her close and dry her tears so she needn’t suffer it alone. We would be everything she needed us to be, and we were prepared to make hell for anyone or anything that kept her from happiness.

I loved them so much. My vampires. My perfect, ridiculous little family.


End file.
